Posted
by
Soulskill
on Friday February 25, 2011 @06:01PM
from the and-now-nobody's-happy dept.

Julie188 writes "Canonical has reacted to backlash over its insane deal with Banshee by establishing a marginally better new deal. Banshee is a media/music player for Linux (and Windows and Mac) that supports music purchases via Amazon MP3. It will ship with Ubuntu 11.04. Amazon pays 10% to its affiliates — websites and software that send it business. Banshee had been donating its Amazon affiliate proceeds to GNOME. But Amazon's MP3 store competes with Canonical's MP3 store, Ubuntu One. So Canonical thought that it should help itself to 75% of the affiliate money from Banshee/Amazon sales and leave 25% for GNOME. The Banshee group said no thanks, we'll disable Amazon for Ubuntu users. Canonical is refusing to let Banshee disable Amazon. It has instead said it will contribute some money from Ubuntu One to GNOME but it still intends on keeping the lion's share for itself."

Ok, I'm getting a new business laptop in a week or so anyway, so it's the perfect time to start using debian instead of Ubuntu anyway.

I can't say I will mind, the last couple of Ubuntu releases were shit, I couldn't even upgrade to the last one as a bug is still unfixed that makes wifi speeds crawl at 70kbyte/s tops for certain wireless cards.

Well off-topic now from the Canonical/Banshee/GNOME shitfest, but I really like Arch. The best Linux setups I've ever had were Gentoo, back in 2005, and then Arch in about 2007. Unfortunately last time I installed Arch I had a motherfucker of a time getting X Windows running and ended up ditching it and putting Ubuntu back on because I'm running out of time to spend the time getting something running. When I get that computer back I'm going back to Arch again. (Or Gentoo if I suddenly start getting hard-ons

PPAs are a great way to have the latest version of a handful of programs, and have nothing to do with hell that I'm aware of. But yeah, if you want cutting edge everything then Ubuntu's six month release cycle is probably not for you.

Debian depending on the version you install can be far behind or raw bleeding edge like Arch, but at least Arch gives some semblance of Desktop stability.The point of the previous post was a recommendation to try Arch.

Everyone realizes this is Open Source Software, right? Every distro (Arch, recommended above, Debian, and Red Hat) all "take" other people's software and make money off of it. Canonical isn't under any obligation to cut GNOME or Banshee in at all. If Banshee didn't want it this way, the devs should have released freeware.

That's not quite true. Arch and Debian do not make money off it.Beside Red Hat is one of the biggest open source contributor (Ubuntu isn't), so I am, for one, pretty much happy they get some money and don't die off it - so we keep getting more open source software.

I'm not a huge fan of Canonical, but this argument over modifying an open-source application is silly. (In addition, Canonical contributes a good amount to FLOSS given its size, though not necessarily to the kernel itself -- Launchpad, U1 client, app indicators, and Unity are just recent examples.)

If I release something as FLOSS, that doesn't mean you can just turn around and sell it. FLOSS gives you the right to modify and redistribute, it doesn't give you ownership nor does it take ownership away from me

Actually, that is exactly what it means.

However if you have a copyright on the name, e.g. firefox, and i want to redistribute/sell my modified version, i might have to rename it to something like iceweasel first.

Remember the story a few days ago about why Ubuntu no longer gets love from slashdotters and the Linux community? I think shenanigans like this says it all.

I suppose you could call it shenanigans; but it is all perfectly within the bounds of the MIT/X11 license Banshee is released under. There's nothing in there that says Canonical can't take Banshee's code and re-enable the Amazon mp3 functionality - quite the contrary, the freedom to modify it is expressly stated.

This is one reason why more mainstream commercial licenses are restrictive. You can't give people the freedom to make changes, only to complain when you don't like the changes they've made.

You can't give people the freedom to make changes, only to complain when you don't like the changes they've made.

Of course I can. Just because you are free to implement whatever changes you choose, does not mean that I am no longer free to disagree with your choices, or that I am not free to attempt to change your mind.

You do not have to follow my desires, that is your freedom. I do not have to like your choices, that is my freedom.

The Ubuntu project is also losing support from developers over these things. I quit the project when they added the Ubuntu One music store, started selling proprietary software through software center, and became a peddler for MPEG-4 patent licenses. Most of my friends who used to be Ubuntu members have since quit as well, none of us want to follow them down the dark path they're headed.

I should probably update the email address associated with my slashdot account.

Question:How EXACTLY do you expect Canonical to pay for the serious R&D required to bring Ubuntu up the the levels of OSX, iOS, and Windows 7 in ease of use?

First, going by past performance, I don't expect Canonical to pay for any "serious R&D". They haven't been able to get any serious traction with OEMs, despite this being where most of their resources go, so there goes their dream of OEM support contracts, and the revenue from them to fund development.

Second, an example of what they consider "serious R&D" - the Unity interface - was a total waste of time. Compare it with Android/Gingerbread, and ask yourself which of the two an O

Which makes this whole kerfluffle look a bit ridiculous.
But more than that, how does Canonical have control over the money that Banshee is donating to GNOME? Does Banshee send a check to Canonical with a request that it be forwarded to GNOME?

Canonical modified the version of Banshee that it ships with Ubuntu to use their own Amazon affiliate code instead of Banshee's everytime a purchase is made. This is perfectly legal, since anyone can modify Banshee's source code. However, it is pretty shady IMHO; no better than the people that slap another name on OSS and try to sell it to unknowing consumers.

no better than the people that slap another name on OSS and try to sell it to unknowing consumers.

That would appear to only be valid if the end customer doesn't know. If Canonical is being upfront about it, and not trying to hide it, then I am not sure it is "wrong" in any broad sense of the phrase. Not preferable to Banshee? Perhaps, as you state, the license clearly allows it. Banshee has actively chosen an license that specifically allows this, if it is a big deal, they can change licenses. Based on comments above, the developers aren't the ones who are complaining anyway, just the bloggers.

I don't think it's shady at all. Canonical build a complete operating environment. They take the majority of the code from the community, patch it heavily, contribute their own functionality and server resources, and integrate it all. They aren't simply selling a CD with stuff they've burned from the web. What the end user gets is Ubuntu, not a software collection.

When that user installs Ubuntu, installs a media player from Canonical's app centre, and then buys music, that sale is directly attributable to Ubuntu. If Banshee didn't exist, Canonical would use another media player to do the same thing or write their own if there wasn't one suitable. The actual media player in use isn't important. Canonical built the product, Canonical pushed the service, and Canonical runs the servers behind the app centre.

On a side note, doesn't just about every distro do the same thing with Firefox's default homepage and Google? Except without contributing anything at all back to Mozilla.org?

I'm not particularly enthused about the way the article writer spun this. It sounds like somebody at Canonical overstepped his bounds and made a mistake. But the article author keeps saying Canonical shouldn't have... Canonical shouldn't have... Canonical shouldn't have... the author sounds like he has an axe to grind and is using this screwup as an excuse. It reads like he's seen that somebody made a mistake but is deliberately pushing the idea that Canonical the organisation did this deliberately.

A solution could be to offer the user the choice of to whom the affiliate money goes. I would probably select Banshee, but at least you have a choice. Of course, Canonical would probable set the default to Canocical:)

That might work except that Ubuntu is all about removing 'customisation' options -- For instance: Screen saver options.

I'd take solution #3 or #4:
1. Do nothing
2. Code up an affiliate link switcher and give the users the choice
3. Uninstall Banshee & compile/install a version from the Banshee Dev's repo.
4. Uninstall Ubuntu & Install another distro that doesn't screw the Gnome devs every fucking chance they get.

Do you really expect a Distro that actively gets rid of any "usability" problems like

Why on earth do the Banshee developers give away 100% of the money rather than using it towards paying themselves and investing that money into their own software in some way?

More importantly, why on earth would Canonical piss off large swaths of the Linux community over something that has so far only generated a couple thousand dollars. Maybe in a few years of building, it might add up to the salary they pay one developer.

OSS programmers who finally find a way to get some meager return on their investment ought to at least use it to get some smoking goodhardware in return. Even if it doesn't pay all the bills, donating ALL it to someone else's project seems pointless.

Giving it all away to GNOME never made any sense in the first place. And the few shekels won't even show upon Gannonical's bottom line.

But more to the point, this type of funding arrangement, where a couple cent

As usual, many./'ers are taking the legalistic approach of noting that Mark Shuttleworth can switch the commission system in Banshee. But that kind of comment is hardly useful. Of course, he can switch the commission system.

The more interesting question is: ought he?

Consider: You take a piece of code, given freely, with only the compensation being to give a commission to a separate open source project (GNOME), and you switch it to give the

I downloaded Ubuntu a while back because it was simple to install, it was straightforward to use, and it meant I didn't have to spend my time doing sysadmin-y things.

But what is all this bullshit about integrated mp3 stores? I want a fucking operating system with some basic general-purpose tools. If I want to buy mp3's I'll go do that; I don't want my operating system worrying about how I should. (Of course, I expect my distribution to include a media/player/ -- that's something else entirely.)

Because the media players Ubuntu includes have an integrated MP3 store, probably because the most popular media player in the US (read: Apple's) also has one.

Besides, if you wanted nothing but an OS with some basic general-purpose tools you'd be using Debian, not Ubuntu which has always prided itself in being the "everything and the kitchen sink" of Linux distros.

That's a funny way to spell Windows Media Player. I mean, even after you discount the not insignificant amount of people who install a different player on their Windows boxes, Microsoft still wins through sheer market share. Keep trying, Apple. But $110/bbl oil is not conducive to lavish consumer spending.

You are spot on with your analogy. Ubuntu calls itself "Linux for Human Beings" and is trying to be the cuddle and coddle flavor of the Linux World. It is trying to make itself more attractive to that need their OS to think for them. In a manner of speaking.

Mint actually does better when it comes to proprietary packages (it ships with some, especially drivers, and can configure them out of the box, unlike Ubuntu). What I referred to are various ways Canonical uses to monetize Ubuntu - like that music and app store of theirs.

I downloaded Ubuntu a while back because it was simple to install, it was straightforward to use, and it meant I didn't have to spend my time doing sysadmin-y things.

But what is all this bullshit about integrated mp3 stores? I want a fucking operating system with some basic general-purpose tools. If I want to buy mp3's I'll go do that; I don't want my operating system worrying about how I should. (Of course, I expect my distribution to include a media/player/ -- that's something else entirely.)

Oh, climb down from that ledge before you hurt yourself.

You don't have to have anything to do with the mp3 store. Its a feature, not a requirement.You can install anything you want, and buy music any way you want, or not buy at all.

The OEM Services group is the largest part of Canonical, according to (Canonical CEO Jane) Silber , and it works with OEMs and other hardware suppliers to get the Ubuntu variant of Debian Linux installed on machines of all shapes and sizes (netbooks, desktops, servers).

This is a complete mischaracterization of what has happened. There have been several bloggers that have been outraged on the behalf the Banshee/Gnome developers, but the Banshee devs have not been upset with this decision.

In fact, the situation is far better than the summary says. First, Banshee will ship with the store enabled on Ubuntu with a 75/25 affliate split between Canonical and Gnome, respectively. Neither side has a problem with this. Second, the official Canonical music store will do a similar split (75/25), even though Gnome doesn't have anything to do with its development.

Sure, the deal sounds like shit for Gnome, especially the Banshee part, but the freaking people that develop the application weren't upset by it. Furthermore, Canonical is splitting their store.

The developers that have the right to complain about this decision aren't, so it doesn't seem like anyone else should either.

Canonical isn't perfect, but why such the hate lately? If you aren't a developer or directly related to the Gnome Foundation, STFU. Stop being outraged on other people's behalf.

thank you. the rambling slashdot "summary" left me completely confused as to why i should give a shit even if someone was "harmed". your summary makes it clear that this is pretty much a win/win as far as the parties involved are concerned (and who else should be?).

the banshee team default position is to take nothing for themselves and pass on the full referrer fee, i.e. 0.1 of banshee amazon purchases, to GNOME. banshee's amazon service steps on Canonical's ubuntu one service, so Canonical didn't like that and offered to give 25% to GNOME, making it 0.025 of banshee amazon purchases. banshee was pissed and wanted the amazon part removed completely from the ubuntu distro. Canonical is overriding this (it's their distro and the code is Free) but as a sop is kicking in 25% of their ubuntu one profit to GNOME.

apparently banshee has no financial self-interest in this matter, while Canonical has their own. if Canonical went with the banshee default, GNOME would get 0.1 of all amazon's gross profit through banshee (call it AGross). under Canonical's first offer, GNOME would get 0.025*AGross. under banshee's (imho rather hissy) counter-offer GNOME would get _nothing at all_ from ubuntu users. Canonical overrides this and makes the "benevolent dictator" offer that GNOME gets 0.025*AGross plus 25% of Canonical's net profit from ubuntu one, for a total of 0.025*AGross+0.25*UNet.

Yeah, Canonical are being assholes here (and it's worth noting, taking a very large middleman cut). However, GNOME's worst outcome would have been Banshee's counteroffer. The banshee default, which is 0.1*Agross, would be best for GNOME if UNet0.3AGross. I do find the latter VERY unlikely, so yeah, GNOME is getting shafted relative to the banshee default. On the other hand, they are doing better than if banshee had run their scorched earth policy, and Canonical has (imho) earned some soft social capital by offering a user-friendly linux and is thus delivering new money to GNOME.

here is the run-down: canonical benefits; banshee gets screwed but loses nothing in terms of cash; GNOME... well, it really depends on how big the buying-music-through-linux market is. i wouldn't personally be surprised if ubuntu quadruples this market, so GNOME may well pull out ahead.

in the bigger picture, it does seem a bit unfair in retrospect that novell (the banshee sponsor) fore went the first cut of these banshee-deals. on the other hand, they're novell...

i meant that the Banshee default would be best if UNet < 0.3AGross, and that the Canonical position is best if UNet > 0.3AGross. The latter is VERY unlikely, so GNOME is getting shafted relative to the default (but may pull out ahead, as i say above).

It has been shown time and time again that humans prefer to default to having nothing over being treated unfairly. IMO, this is one of the strongest built-in social regulation tools our evolutionary path equipped us with.

It ensures that a majority will try to strive towards perceived(!) fairness.

That local customs, prejudices and whatnot influence this perception is a given.

I agree with the rest of your post, except for this bit.
How is this shit for Gnome, it is not like the Gnome project is entitled to this money in some way. They are receiving 25%, when they could very well be receiving 0. Canonical is actually being generous here by donating those 25%.
As you point out the banshee developers don't have any problem with this. But even if they did, they already gave written permission to do this (the license).
Canonical has the right to keep 100% of this money if they so

Uhm, no. That is not correct RTFA. As it is, the Banshee developers elected to disable the store by default, preferring it to Canonicals split deal. The Banshee developers decided that requiring the users to manually activate the store, but giving GNOME a 100% cut was preferable.
Canonical asked the developers to choose from 2 options, but when their choice was not what Canonical wanted they simply did the opposite anyway.

Did you RTFA? The maintainers they asked were *not* happy with the decision and the maintainers have *gone on record* as saying it's "unreasonable" - I know that one of the OMGUbuntu folks has been going around saying he's a Banshee contributor (he is, but not one of the maintainers) and trying to characterize it as everything is OK - but that is NOT the case.

What a mess. Ubuntu / Canonical rubbing people up the wrong way again.

Thank goodness for Amarok.... that is, when Amarok developers eventually get their fingers out of their behind and add back all the features they stripped from KDE3 Amarok 1 for the so called "improved" KDE4 Amarok 2 version.

I'm no Ubuntu fan really, but I find it quite funny how the GNOME devs are famous for not giving a fuck about their users opinions, and still they're somehow outraged when someone doesn't give a fuck about theirs.

If Banshee disables Amazon, then theoretically that would increase the sales to Canonical's MP3 store. So by disallowing Banshee from doing this, basically Canonical is saying that their 75% cut of the affiliate money from people willing to buy MP3s from Amazon is more profitable than the direct sales they would get from people willing to buy from their no-name MP3 store. In the spirit of the original article, I tried to be as confusing with this post as possible.

The problem Linux has had is the ability to help a company keep it's lights on. When it's sold by companies like IBM or Redhat, people are paying for the name more than the product. The community, which is a strength of Linux, is rather harsh when you try stuff, screaming about the "free as in beer/speech" bit.

And that's fine. The strength of one's opinion is why we love Linux. Still, most ignore the fact that the free "as in beer" part still has to be paid by somebody. So the community ends up ditc

I put ubuntu on one of my laptops because it Just Worked(tm). That was version 9.04. Everything on the machine worked, and it even handled setting up the broadcom wifi firmware for me so I didn't have to futz with fwcutter, et al.

I've been upgrading steadily ever since. At this point in time, I've been let down more often by the hardware itself (two HD failures and now the CPU is dying...) than by Ubuntu.

Ubuntu is stable, reliable, and the single most user friendly linux distro I have ever used, and it keeps getting better. It lets me do what I need to do without getting in my way so I have more time left over for other inconsequential things like... oh... my life.

I just don't get all this indignation regarding a company that is trying to put out a viable consumer friendly OS for free, while trying to make enough money (in an honest, not privacy invading way) so that it can continue to do so.

I just don't get all this indignation regarding a company that is trying to put out a viable consumer friendly OS for free, while trying to make enough money (in an honest, not privacy invading way) so that it can continue to do so.

Its like being a Canadian entertainer, everyone loves you as long as you're the underdog but as soon as you get a movie or record deal in the US and start making money you have sold out and are now part of the machine.

Sounds like it is the *only* distribution you have used in the last 10 years. Try something else and be amazed. All those silly bugs that stop you from just *getting something done* in Ubuntu disappear.

Oh, and I would have thought what all the indignation is about is pretty obvious? They are putting out an OS for consumers to use for free, but in every single release they strip out the functionality that consumers love and replace it with something most of them hate. They are effectively compounding proble

I think some of the objection is that Ubuntu takes 300GB of source code written by others, adds probably 10MB of source they've written, does some QA, and distributes it for a profit, giving very little back to those who wrote the original 300GB.

How much money does the guy who contributed 1000 lines to gcc get from the Ubuntu mp3 store? I doubt the store would work if it weren't for gcc building their code, or whatever.

Lots of people contribute to FOSS for the fun of it, and they don't really expect anythi

Been using Ubuntu for four years now on six different machines at home and work (including PPC version, btw), and quite frankly haven't had any of that sort of trouble. Since I have to use other Linux professionally, happen to know Debian requires a bit more work to make useful desktop, more manual downloading of drivers and changing/dev files. That kind of hours of tinkering was fun back in the day but I'd rather be up and running quickly. That Ubuntu has done.

Something sure does seem fishy about this whole arrangement, so I can understand why bloggers have been going apeshit (though the developers seem OK with it [slashdot.org]). Historically, this was a tactic of commercial malware, and overwriting third-party affiliate IDs with your own - in the browser or any other HTTP stream - was a good way to get your product removed by antispyware applications [spywareguide.com]. (Now, get off my lawn!)

Same here. In fact, the reason I'm a CLI geek is that I find GUIs and menus confusing and hard to memorize, but commands, arguments, man pages, etc are pretty easy. Maybe most of us who prefer the CLI are just wired a bit differently than most people...

I'm the same. GUI:s drive me crazy. You can't search them. I used Windows XP (company policy >_) in my previous job for two years and never learned the icons on the lower right corner. I had to take the mouse cursor over them every time to get the balloon help which tells you what that icon means. Running Linux on XP saved my sanity.

The last time I made a serious attempt to use Linux as a main desktop machine I could not find a good mp3 player. Banshee was the best, but too buggy and the interface didn't feel right, sort of a knockoff of itunes which already has a pretty lousy interface. Nothing came close to WinAmp, which despite it's horrible crime of being Windows-only (though I guess it's moving to android too) is the best mp3 player I've ever used.

XMMS was fine last time I used Linux. Not exactly full-featured but if you're comparing with WinAmp you're not looking at iTunes anyway -- you're looking at a simple media player that's nice enough to use.

I would point out that I last used XMMS about five years back, though, before all my machines turned into Macs, not entirely through decisions of my own, so it might be development has totally stalled and it's not worth my recommendation. These things happen...

I find this incredibly ironic. It is no mistake that Free and Open software licences grant the moral right for recipients to modify their code as they see fit. It the the licences very reason for existing.

If the Banshee developers didn't want other people profiting off the code they should have released it (or the plugin if possible) under a non-commercial licence.

To grant someone a Free licence and then complain bitterly when someone has the temerity to use the rights intentionally granted therein see

Before everybody starts bashing Ubuntu (this is slashdot afterall), the article mentions that the analysts feel this is a better deal for gnome than what they had. Gnome now gets 25% of sales from Ubuntu One and Amazon. Not just for Banshee, but also Rhythmbox. From Amazon, Canonical is the affiliate and as such aren't required to give anything to Gnome for the use of Banshee or Rhythmbox.

Ubuntu may make mistakes in it's relationship with its partners, but in this case, it appears that they are being quite generous.

In fact, Burt says that the Banshee team had unanimously opted to turn off the Amazon store when given the choice, but now "Canonical came up with their own plan: essentially the option we rejected."

Further, Burt doesn't seem pleased with the way Canonical has handled the situation. "Canonical offering us options and then going back on them when we didn't pick their preferred one was not reasonable." Lorentz says he agrees "wholeheartedly

I've never heard of Banshee. I suspect most people haven't. Now it will appear with every new Ubuntu 11.04 install.

What if the amount of money heading to Gnome (the 25% of Amazon's 10% kickback) is actually greater than the 100% Banshee has been donating? What if it's many times greater? What if this, in part, also means that Ubuntu gets to keep its doors open? What if folks made lots of Amazon purchases via Ubuntu's Banshee instead of inventing.... yet another... reason to act like malcontents?

Canonical needs to figure out a business model that amounts to more than Shuttleworth’s good graces. There are no profitable desktop Linux desktop publishers. That is not a workable long term situation. In 2008 Canonical said Ubuntu had 3-5 years to get profitable. If the low end of that range means anything then Times Up! as they say..

I fully support OSS software, but you start in what those kind of comments and I'm done listening too you. It shows you to be an irrational fanboy with no grasp on the fact that it does take effort to produce software. The dollar amount to attach to it may be debatable but the effort part isn't, if you want to blatantly disregard it, or are too ignorant to recognize it, you aren't worth wasting my time.

Only if you are into the FSF type movement. Most people interpret "free software" as without-charge; i.e., what we would call freeware (as opposed to shareware).

The average person is not too concerned about having absolute "freedom" with their software, and aren't too concerned about Canonical's deals with Banshee, etc. Look at how popular MS became and how popular Apple is apparently becoming. That wasn't based on freedom of software, software sources, etc.

You're so full of shit. Libre is a superset of gratis when using those terms as FSF/OSI do to describe 'free' software. I'm a real Linux/Unix user, and I use Ubuntu for most of my needs. It's a good OS.

Canonical has every right to do what they're doing. If you don't like it, then go to another OS, fine. But don't compare them to Novell and CERTAINLY not Oracle! The OS is still libre-gratis-free, if it's in their main/universe repos. Don't FUD.

Anyway judging Canonical is irrelevant, they are free to do what they want and you are free to follow them or follow others or fork. Your document aren't hostages of canonical choices. That's the good thing of FOSS.

'Improved' is a matter of perspective. It's been going downhill lately. Less innovation, more breakages with every release. Serious and glaring bugs going ignored for years on end. Tried to use 2-pass encoding with libx264 and ffmpeg on 10.xx recently? Known bug since 9.10 was released and completely ignored. And it's not a minor bug either, it's actually broken the pipelines of several production studios and marketing agencies I've dealt with, who have all had to switch distros now just to be able to

Mark Shuttleworth has gone off the deep end recently with a lot of his decisions for Ubuntu. Dropping Gnome for Unity, and in future even dropping X for Wayland. All in the name of some vague future usability bonus, but at the same time alienating a lot of software developers and Linux community members.

Granted, a lot of what Ubuntu has done has Ubuntu one of the most user friendly distros, and I think Mark Shuttleworth has been heavily influenced by Apple's OSX originally and iOS later on, with Shuttlewort

Mark Shuttleworth has gone off the deep end recently with a lot of his decisions for Ubuntu. Dropping Gnome for Unity, and in future even dropping X for Wayland. All in the name of some vague future usability bonus, but at the same time alienating a lot of software developers and Linux community members.

I agree with most of the points you made but I disagree with you in the quoted paragraph. I have a partition on my laptop devoted to the newest Ubuntu Alpha version and I have gnome shell on my laptop which I build every couple of weeks to see what changes are being made. In my opinion, Unity is by far the more usable of the two and is superior performance-wise. I do understand that both are in active development at the time though and this might change. I don't see shipping Unity as going off the deep-end

You should really try to admin both an Ubuntu (or Debian since they just rip off the packages) and RedHat box before spouting out nonsense.

Quick simple test, observe how all the config files for apache are nicely presented and split by module making it easy to edit where as RedHat just stick them anywhere. That's just one example, but don't take my word for it. Try both for a reasonable period of time then have some self reflection.

Sorry, I was sleeping. Now that I'm awake to see this story, I am here!Ubuntu has already bundled software that uses Mono with Ubuntu when there is a perfectly good substitute, tomboy notes. It can be replaced with gnote, which is a port of tomboy to C++. Sometimes they also bundle F-Spot, for which numerous good substitutes exist (gthumb, anyone?) Meanwhile Rhythmbox does everything Banshee does, including supporting iPods and MTP devices.